#6 Deathtrap Dungeon
Lets face it. There's not much I can say about Deathtrap Dungeon that hasn't already been said. This book is arguably the most famous story of the series rivaling the mighty 'Warlock' itself in reprints and versions. Everyone I knew who read these as a kid either had this or had read it.
How do I feel about it? I love it!
As far as the writing goes it's basically flawless, the exploration of the dungeon and characters/monsters you meet are both exciting and well rounded. The traps are well thought out and there is a good chance of completing the book without falling foul of a 'cheap' unavoidable death.
There are fellow adventurers to find and interact with, some useful, some not. The basic idea is the 'go find stuff that may/may not be useful and hang on to it' quest type, made interesting by the sheer variety of items and treasures to be had.
The art is again all provided by Mr McCaig. The cover is among my favourites, and lets face it, the beast depicted is truly hideous. The book sports a pen and ink illo of some sort of encounter every three pages or so, some are so original in composition of pose and lighting that I don't think they have ever been equaled. Honestly, If all you wanted to do in life was draw awesome dungeons, ferocious monsters and cool characters you could do worse than study this gamebook and Iain's hard work. What a wonderful man he is =)
One interesting side note of Deathtrap Dungeon's fame is its appearance as a game (there were a few different platforms it was ported for but the only one I am familiar with is the Playstation release)
I have never had a chance to play this game personally (although I look for an old Ps1 copy of it constantly!) so there's not much I can talk about =( One thing I will say however is that they knew their target audience when they started on the advertising!
Check this out =)
Reminds me of my high school...And here's a rather, er, revealing shot from the game itself...
Hmm. Don't remember fighting a dragon? Or meeting a woman who, ah, met those requirements...
Who cares! It all looks fairly good fun, and from the few vids of it I have seen on youtube, it all works well with plenty of teenage hormone riddled angst and violence.
So all in all?
Def one of the most rewarding and painless reads in the series, great art, great encounters and good pacing.
Get it!
After seeing that advert I might just go out and find that game, just so I can see some blocky tits :D
ReplyDeleteWonder what the game is actually like, because apart from the terrible graphics that the PS1 had they still had some pretty original games on there. I still remember shitting myself playing "Resident Evil" for first time! They released so many games on that console that there were bound to be a few good ones.
Haha! Yeah def one of my fav consoles (I was a teen when it was released so got to spend faaaaar to much time on it!)
DeleteThe game is hard but fair (if that makes any sense) A bit like the original Tomb Raider game?
I didn't have too much of a prob with 'Resi Evil' but I swear 'Silent Hill' once made my friend and I so scared we had to turn the console of and all the lights on! (We were house-sitting out in the country)
Nothing wrong with blocky tits and a decent imagination!